Harvard Scientist Urges People To Stop Drinking Low Fat Milk

Low fat dairy might seem like the ideal choice to retain in your diet, but it’s far from being the healthy option. A Harvard scientist, David Ludwig, is urging individuals to be aware of the dangers of low fat milk. He claims it is better to go back to the full-bodied variety, and here are the reasons why.

Obesity

There’s word going around that full-fat milk can make you gain weight – which is why a lot of people are going for ‘skim-slim’ milk. Studies show, however, that this is not true. There’s actually a benefit in using full-fat milk in that those who consume full-fat often have an easier time maintaining their weight.

Heart Problems

Full-fat milk also contains a healthy dose of phytanic acid, which helps maintain insulin levels and blood pressure. There’s also conjugated linolic acid in the milk known for reducing the risks of diabetes, cancer, and heart disease. Consume this on a daily basis and you’ll be able to lower the risks of these 4 common health issues all at once.

Special Vitamins

Some vitamins and minerals are hard to come by in a person’s typical diet. These include retinol and vitamin K2 which are known as fat-soluble vitamins. They’re available through full-fat milk though, and should make your diet more comprehensive.

Dental Health

When it comes to healthier teeth and gums, milk is often a cited ‘must’ in your diet. Unfortunately, teeth health is only benefited through full-fat milk.

Drinking the skim variety won’t really give you any type of benefit. At least nowhere near what full-fat can provide. If you’re partial to low-fat chocolate milk, that actually makes things worse. The blended variety already contains loads of sugar which would only promote tooth decay.

What About Calcium?

There’s no question that both skim milk and full-fat milk contain calcium for better bone health. Hence, if you’re drinking milk primarily for this purpose, then the need to ‘switch’ may not be as prevalent. Bear in mind, however, that calcium is a relatively common mineral in various types of food.

Green and leafy vegetables are packed with calcium in amounts definitely higher than milk. The unique properties of full-fat however, are better than skim milk and should be taken into account, and if you’re going to drink one, it makes sense to choose the type that offers more with each gulp.

Saturated Fats

It’s a common mistake to think that ‘full fat’ as written in milk is the same as the ‘fat’ that’s attached to the body. They’re two completely different things and saturated fats which can be found in full-fat milk are actually desirable.

Replacing saturated fats with ‘alternatives’ can lead to various problems such as increased instances of obesity, lower amounts of good cholesterol, increased bad cholesterol, and increased chances of coronary heart disease.

So when scientists talk about the benefits of milk, they’re actually talking about the full-fat variety. Simply put, the dangers of low fat dairy involve doing yourself out of numerous vitamins and minerals. Bear in mind though that ‘low fat’ isn’t limited to milk as there are also cheese products advertised under the same label.

Sources: Real Farmacy, Chris Kresser, and Jama Network.

If you enjoyed reading this post, don’t forget to connect with me on Facebook or Google+ or download my FREE Book “Amy’s Home Kitchen”, packed with my family’s favorite healthy, clean and delicious recipes. 

Looking for a way to live a healthy lifestyle while eating delicious, colorful meals and losing or maintaining weight the healthy way? Click here for more info

Harvard Scientist Urges People To Stop Drinking Low Fat Milk

Injection which could remedy obesity produced at Harvard and MIT

A remedy for weight problems could be just an injection away right after scientists at Harvard and MIT found that a small DNA tweak leads to the metabolism to burn up extra excess fat.

Although it was considered that piling on the pounds was largely due to overeating and lack of exercise, researchers now believe that genetics perform a critical part in whether or not fat is stored or utilised up as power.

Folks with greater BMIs (Entire body Mass Index) usually carry a variant of the FTO gene, which has been dubbed the ‘obesity gene.’

Now researchers at Harvard and MIT have identified that the ‘obesity gene’ switches on two other genes which stop fat being burned up as heat – a approach named thermogenesis.

And, crucially they have shown it is attainable to flip off individuals genes using a ground breaking gene editing approach which snips out bad DNA code and replaces it with the appropriate sequence.

A pioneering task to map 100,000 genomes will revolutionise medication in Britain  Photo: Alamy

The scientists feel the approach could prevent or even remedy weight problems in those people with the faulty gene and negate the results of a large-unwanted fat diet program.

“Weight problems has traditionally been witnessed as the outcome of an imbalance between the amount of meals we eat and how a lot we workout, but this see ignores the contribution of genetics to each individual’s metabolism,” explained senior writer Professor Manolis Kellis, of MIT’s Computer Science and Artificial Intelligence Laboratory (CSAIL) and of the Broad Institute.

“Realizing the causal variant underlying the obesity association may possibly permit genome editing as a therapeutic avenue for people as threat.

“By manipulating this new pathway, we could switch in between vitality storage and energy dissipation delivering new hope for a cure towards obesity.”

In Britain, 25 per cent of adults are obese — 12 million individuals — in contrast with fewer than 3 per cent in the Seventies. The proportion is predicted to expand to 1 in three by 2030 and a lot more than half by 2050.

Excess weight gain is a chance factor for numerous well being issues, which includes diabetes, heart disease, stroke and some cancers. Weight problems and diabetes presently costs the United kingdom over £5 billion every single 12 months which is most likely to rise to £50 billion in the next 36 years.

To test the theory that a faulty gene was driving fat achieve, researchers gathered fat samples from Europeans carrying both the ‘obesity’ variant and a regular copy of the FTO gene.

They discovered that in folks with the variant 1 letter of DNA code had been replaced by another. The wrong code was causing genes IRX3 and IRX5 to flip on when they should have been off.

Earlier studies have shown that IRX3 and IRX5 switch on in the course of occasions of unwanted fat loss in the entire body, this kind of as throughout intervals of starvation to conserve excess fat.

Researchers utilized a new technological innovation referred to as the Crispr/Cas9 technique to edit the DNA code and repair the sequence in mice and human cells. The method sees a modified protein (Cas9) injected into the physique the place it can snip away distinct sections of DNA.

Mice who had been bred to obese noticed a reduction of body excess weight and all key unwanted fat merchants, and full resistance to a substantial-fat diet plan.

The researchers are now hunting at how to make the process beneficial for people.

The study was published in the New England Journal of Medication.

• Sugar tax to spend for treating weight problems

Injection which could remedy obesity produced at Harvard and MIT

Lancet Editors Increase More Questions About Prominent Harvard Stem Cell Researcher

There is more difficulty for Piero Anversa, the prominent and controversial stem cell researcher.

Right now the Lancet issued an expression of concern about an influential, a lot-cited stem cell paper. As very first reported by Retraction Watch, an investigation at Harvard Medical College and Brigham and Women’s Hospital has raised worries about the integrity of data coming from Piero Anversa’s laboratory at the Brigham contained in the 2011 SCIPIO research published in the Lancet.

Here is the total Expression of Concern issued by the Lancet:

On March 25, 2014, Gretchen Brodnicki, Harvard Health care School’s Dean for Faculty and Investigation Integrity, wrote to The Lancet to inform us that “Harvard Medical School (HMS) and Brigham and Women’s Hospital (BWH) are reviewing considerations about the integrity of certain information generated in a laboratory at BWH and incorporated in the following published paper…[the] 2011 Lancet SCIPIO paper”. The emphasis of this investigation is on two supplemental figures published on the internet (figures 2A and three). As far as we are mindful, the investigation is confined to the perform finished at BWH. Gretchen Brodnicki continues, “Because evaluation of this paper is ongoing, we cannot supply additional specifics at this time.” In even more discussions with Harvard Health care College, we have been told that the present investigation into this element of the work reported in the SCIPIO trial is likely to take numerous months. As quickly as The Lancet receives further details, we will inform readers accordingly.

In accordance to experienced sources, the Harvard letter requested a total retraction of the article by the Lancet. But without having much more details about the issues raised by the Harvard investigation the editors believed an expression of concern was the most they could justify.

As I reported in 2011, SCIPIO was the subject of considerable hype at the time of its unique publication. ABC News, CBS News and other media outlets utilised phrases like “medical breakthrough” and “heart failure remedy.” ABC News correspondent Richard Besser was so enthusiastic that anchor Diane Sawyer commented that she had by no means noticed him “so fired up.” The very first author of SCIPIO, Roberto Bolli, said the function could represent “the greatest advance in cardiology in my lifetime.”

Earlier this week, as a consequence of the same Brigham and Harvard investigation, a 2012 paper published in Circulation was retracted. Anversa was the senior author on that paper. The retraction was especially impressive because a single of the co-authors was Joseph Loscalzo, the editor-in-chief of Circulation and the chairman of the division of medication at the Brigham.

A single Harvard researcher who has long been familiar with Anversa’s perform mentioned that numerous men and women at Harvard are not amazed by these developments. “If something it’s surprising how prolonged it is taken for these inquiries to surface.”

Lancet Editors Increase More Questions About Prominent Harvard Stem Cell Researcher

Hack Your Naps For Productivity And Health Through An MIT And Harvard Med School Researcher

The wellness rewards of getting sufficient sleep have acquired a good deal of consideration recently. The picture of brain fluid cycling rapidly for the duration of sleep and washing away amyliod plaques and other noxious byproducts of the day’s mental exercise is compelling sufficient to persuade the chronically rest deprived to try to hit the sack a bit earlier. But the demands (actual and imagined) of post-present day, web-mediated daily life are such that a strong eight hours of down time is tough for most of us to attain.

This is the place napping methods come in. A swift appear at Google trends reveals that search interest in rest has risen by 50% in the previous decade and interest in napping has doubled. And what are people seeking for? Nap approaches for their little ones, of program, but more and more also “power naps” and “nap hacks.” A highly ranked website postfor the term “sleep cycle” boasts, “Alternative Sleep Cycles: You Do not Actually Want six-8 Hours!” How does author Jordan Lejuwaan suggest reaching this? Extreme napping!

Are you up for the “ uberman cycle”? That would be “20 to 30 minute naps each and every four hrs, resulting in six naps each and every day.” The catch? Miss a nap and you will wish you never ever have been born! Much more sensible is the “everyman cycle,” which entails, “one three hour nap and three twenty-minute naps… all of which have equal amounts of time in between every nap.” True geeks, nonetheless, may possibly opt for Buckminster Fuller’s “dymaxion cycle,” which calls for “sleeping for 30 minutes every single 6 hrs. That is 2 hrs a day of sleep!” Apparently he lived in great overall health with this program and described it as, “the most vigorous and alert condition I have ever appreciated.” Closer to reality is what the writer calls the “biphasic /siesta cycle” which consists of “sleeping for 4-4.five hours at night, and then taking a 90 minute nap all around noon.”

As unmanageable as most of the regimens are for any person with responsibilities to other individuals, the 30 and 90 minute nap cycles do have a company basis in science. A significantly more reasonable get on this subject can be located in Nick Meyer’s “A Manual to Optimized Napping.” Meyer is a collaborator with MIT and Harvard Med School graduate student Justin Lee who just finished a effective Kickstarter last weekend for his Napwell napping mask.

Meyer suggests 5 “hacks” to help individuals reap “the proven advantages of napping, including enhanced task functionality, response time, and memory retention.” His prior submit on NASA’s napping study backs these claims up. There is a excellent case to be produced to make time for an afternoon nap as element of your workday, but how can you make sure you do not wake up groggy from “sleep inertia” and shed the potential advantages of your snooze? Here’s how to optimize your naps:

Hack 1: Nap Right after Lunch. This looks apparent since several cultures have historically institutionalized the siesta or mid-afternoon nap, but it looks to be scientifically legitimate. Meyer quotes a rest researcher as saying that the dip in power after lunch phenomenon is observable “even when the person has had no lunch and is unaware of time of day,” but “It is certainly exacerbated by a higher-carbohydrate lunch, and could be more probably to happen in severe morning-kind individuals.”

Hack two: Find A Dark And Quiet Area. Staying away from stimulus tends to make it easier to fall asleep. This again looks apparent, but getting able to fall asleep and sleeping well are not usually the exact same thing. Light is the largest culprit since it inhibits melatonin and resets the biological clock, interfering with sleep. Meyer recommends a sleep mask and earplugs if you cannot find a appropriate nap spot.

Hack 3: Choose twenty Minutes Or 70-90 Minutes. This is where steering clear of “sleep inertia” comes in. There are three stages of rest named right after progressively slower brain waves, alpha, theta and delta. If you sleep for only 20 minutes you get the restful, stage one alpha wave rest and just a bit of the stage two theta wave sleep, but you really do not get in so deep that it is tough to regain alertness. On the other hand, if you have much more than an hour to spare (as if!) a longer nap can allow you to cycle through all 3 sleep stages into slow wave rest (SWS). Meyer writes, “If the napper awakens soon after a cycle of SWS, they obtain numerous of the positive aspects of a full night’s sleep and can perform at a larger level in the afternoon. If a napper wakes up all of a sudden in the course of SWS, they knowledge sleep inertia, and frequently really feel drowsy for up to an hour later.”

Hack 4: You Even now Require To Get Nighttime Rest. Hacking your naps has several rewards, but obtaining a excellent night’s sleep is still the greatest. Naps can restore target and concentration for the duration of your work day, but if you are just also exhausted, you will not be ready to wake up from a quick nap because your physique will swiftly cycle into the deep rest that it most requirements.

Hack 5: Drink Your Coffee In The Morning. Limiting caffeine in the late morning will make a rapid, restorative nap soon after lunch feasible. Caffeine confers a feeling of alertness that does not actually translate to better performance of specified duties that, for instance, involve the recall of specific data. Timing your coffee intake is the topic of an additional publish (and an concern of considerable fascination for me.)

What Meyer does not record as a hack is the Napwell sleep mask itself. This ingenious device (see video below) incorporates a timer into a rest mask for hassle-free nap scheduling. The actual innovation is the way the material of the mask changes opacity to support you fall asleep and then gradually wake up at the required time. This gentle rousing is especially helpful in terms of staying away from sudden waking from SWS and the resulting grogginess. Beyond making it less complicated to build a napping habit, the bodily presence of the Napwell itself gets a trigger to keep in mind to take a nap break during your active day. And the truth that it has MIT and Harvard Med School bonafides will make it simpler to persuade your boss (or co-workers) that you’re not just lazy for wanting to nap! If you missed the Kickstarter, you can still pre-order it for $ 60 (shipment estimated by October 2014.)

– – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – –

To maintain up with Quantum of Material, please subscribe to my updates on Facebook, follow me on Twitter and App.net or include me on Google+.

Hack Your Naps For Productivity And Health Through An MIT And Harvard Med School Researcher